Calling All Hippies. And Not-Hippies.

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Wednesday August 24, 2005 · 12:49 PM PDT

2005/08/24 · 12:49

Sorry - I don't know what the proper term for a not-hippie (or anti-hippie) is. Because that particular phase of the culture wars was before my time - slightly after my parents and slightly before me. But I like to think I would have been a hippie, if I had been born then.

Given that dKos is a largely liberal place, I assumed most of the people here were, at the very least, sympathetic to "hippie" causes, which I take to be peace (at least in the context of Vietnam) and personal freedom.

I, apparently, was wrong, given the hippie-attacking and hippie-defending statements I've seen here the last few days. I understand that the term is being used as shorthand for the pacifist movement in a lot of cases, and is largely linked to debates over protest tactics and pacifism as a philosophical/political approach, which may or may not be entirely correct. That's one of the points of this diary: that perhaps someone who was there can correct whatever misconceptions I might have about that era.

Main point on the flip... Read More

Gender Experiences

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Thursday June 09, 2005 · 1:09 PM PDT

2005/06/09 · 13:09

So the pie flamewars look like they are subsiding a bit, maybe passions have cooled and I think the community at large is coming to the point where most of us would like to have dialogue and reason prevail.

I think Armando's diary is reflective of that fact. One of the things he said was, "Tell us what we need to do." I know I can't do that, because I can't speak for all of the women here. There isn't an all-encompassing women's point of view on this, just as there is not an all-encompassing men's point of view. Read More

What Can Women Hope For?

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Tuesday June 07, 2005 · 9:55 AM PDT

2005/06/07 · 09:55

I personally was not motivated to leave over the pie wars, but I know of more than a few women who have. I've spent a lot more time at Booman Tribune lately than I have recently, and I checked out the new womankossacks blog. From what I can tell, these are smart, passionate, dedicated women, some of the posters who I have most respected and enjoyed here. The kind of women you want on your side in a fight.

Whatever your position on the pie ad, there is no denying that many women have taken this very seriously. And what I see is not people leaving over an ad, but over a lack of respect and refusal to be taken seriously.

I watch the brainstorming over what to do, because if women can't be taken seriously at a progressive blog, then where will they? I watch the idea of a third party being floated - shades of Buchanan and Nader. That call is what prompted me to write this. Read More

Bored of Sex?

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Thursday May 26, 2005 · 9:41 PM PDT

2005/05/26 · 21:41

Never thought I'd say it, but I think I am. A visitor to this planet would conclude that we had conquered all human ills, to the extent that our government had nothing else to do, so they got bored and started mucking around in people's sex lives.

I had always learned that sex was supposed to be private, so you didn't much discuss it in polite company. So find myself wanting to laugh and cry watching the powers that be, at the behest of the Republican Taliban, struggle at to define the boundaries of appropriate sex. So that their version can be approved, be correct, and everyone else can be the Other. So Others can be denied. Birth control. Sex education. Abortion. Marriage equality. Read More

POLL: To Impeach or Not to Impeach

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Thursday May 05, 2005 · 11:48 AM PDT

2005/05/05 · 11:48

That's the question.

Personally, I think we should hold off submitting articles of impeachment and petitioning our congresspeople to introduce them until we can build a wider base of support, or at least make more Murkans cognizant of the fact that Bushco might have done something deserving of impeachment.

Another Kossack pointed out to me that Scoop allows ten spaces for polls. Whether it was intended that way or not, I took it as a suggestion to BE the author of that diary/poll. Read More

Business Paper Recycling

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Wednesday April 27, 2005 · 11:13 AM PDT

2005/04/27 · 11:13

Hi all. I'm posting this diary to ask if any of you Green Kossacks out there has leads or information to companies that recycle business paper/cardboard in the Southern California area.

Quick background: I'm fortunate enough to work for a privately-owned company with a progressive-minded CEO. The CEO put me in charge of developing a recycling program, and we partnered with a company that provides recycling bins and picks up our paper/cardboard waste for recycling at no cost to us. We recycle 1.5 tons/month of paper and cardboard. Yay!

My problem is this: we've been having customer service issues with this company, and they're pissing our facilities manager off. I don't want him to get so P.O.'d that he complains to the CEO about the recycling program (this manager resisted the program in the first place) and I don't want my co-workers to stop recycling because of the confusion with the company. Read More

UN to Protect Human Rights (maybe)

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Thursday April 07, 2005 · 8:24 AM PDT

2005/04/07 · 08:24

Cross-posted on Booman Tribune

The United Nations as an organization is pathetically inefficient at protecting human rights. While the US can go to the Security Council and start a war over false intelligence and secure a coalition, women are raped and children are slaughtered in Sudan while the powers that be squabble.

People go to see Hotel Rwanda and say, "How could the world have let this happen?" and many have no idea that it is happening as they speak in Sudan.

I was a bit heartened to read this morning that Kofi Annan has called for changes to the UN Human Rights body . It seems that he wants to give human rights issues greater import by changing the structure of the human rights organization and elevating it to the stature of the Security Council.
Read More

As simple as that

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Monday March 28, 2005 · 3:27 PM PST

2005/03/28 · 15:27

Cross-posted on Booman Tribune

Here's something about me:

I don't give a flying fuck what you believe: God, Jesus, and/or Allah; Elvis is alive; Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone; the moon is made of green cheese; all of the above or none. It's not my place to care and frankly, I have more important things to worry about.

I respect the beliefs of others, and I expect and demand the same respect. Just because I don't believe as you do doesn't mean I deserve to have your beliefs shoved down my throat. And the stuffing of certain extremist-religious right beliefs down the national throat is rampant these days: the current most obvious example is the Post story about pharmacists being allowed to NOT prescribe birth control AND to refuse to forward the prescription. Read More

We're encouraging poor people to kill themselves now!?

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Tuesday February 01, 2005 · 7:57 PM PST

2005/02/01 · 19:57

The president has proposed a new plan to offer a substantial increase in death benefits for our armed forces. He realized that he can not very much longer glorify himself as commander in chief while endangering his soliders blindly and easily. He has asked everything of these soldiers and their families and gave them nothing. Reenlistments and recruiting are down, naturally, people can't countenance sacrificing so much for...whichever rationale it is this week.

Clearly, American people are getting tired of Bush's War and he has to do something. SAo what does he do? He offers them DEATH PAY. There is something severely wrong with this. Read More

Things to Send a Soldier?

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Thursday January 27, 2005 · 11:23 AM PST

2005/01/27 · 11:23

Hello all. I recently found out that a friend of mine from back home is currently stationed in Fallujah.

I want to send him a package, but I'm not sure what to put in there, and Google isn't helping me out. The sites I found just have links to people who want to sell you stuff to send them. Hock-ptoo (I just mentally spit on war profiteers).

Anyway, I know we have a few soldiers and plenty of people with loved ones in the military here. Can you help me out with suggestions of what to send?

Enforced Freedom and Conscription, or the little LTE that couldn't

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Monday January 24, 2005 · 9:26 AM PST

2005/01/24 · 09:26

Author's note: This started as a LTE, but because I feel strongly about this, it became way too long. I'm posting it here for several reasons, one being I'm a little bit proud of it and I want someone to read it, but mainly because I'd like editing/framing suggestions, because I'm either going to cut it down to make a suitable LTE, or expand it into an op-ed. I hope you like it.

I am writing because I am an American, and I am afraid. I am fearful because I see a military draft being imposed on our sons and daughter in the near future.

I am of the age that if the draft I see coming arrives, I stand to lose my two brilliant younger brothers, and at least five wonderful little cousins, and the friends from college that are already beginning to build the next stage of America, with their degrees and their fledgling businesses and their new spouses. I see them leaving, and dying, and the hearts and hopes and dreams of America going with them. Read More

Rethugs to Blacks: "Victim" blacks vote Dem

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Monday October 04, 2004 · 8:43 AM PDT

2004/10/04 · 08:43

I was alternately disgusted and elated reading this morning's story on Yahoo News. Why elated? Because I feel this racist bastardry has potential to blow up in the Rethug's faces, if given the proper exposure.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040929/ap_on_el_ge/hud_secretary_black_voter s&e=1 Read More

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